A data storage system with a large number of hard disks is known to take a longer period of time to boot (where “boot” is short for “bootstrap”) as compared with a data storage system with a smaller number of hard disks. As is known, booting or bootstrapping (or rebooting) a data storage system (or any computing system wherein software instructions are loaded and executed to control hardware components) involves, upon turning power on or a system reset, performing a power-on self-test, locating and initializing peripheral devices, and then finding, loading and booting up an operating system. Thus, a main reason that a larger storage system takes longer than a smaller storage system to boot up is due to the fact that the larger storage system needs more time to discover and initialize the extra hard disks that are peripherally connected as part of the system through some form of a system bus. Examples of such systems busses that may be used in a data storage system include, but are not limited to, a Peripheral Component Interconnect (PCI) bus or a Peripheral Component Interconnect Express (PCIe) bus.
During this bootstrapping time period, the data storage system and its underlying services, e.g., data de-duplication, are not available for data center applications and services that are utilizing the data storage system. In case such a data storage system is deployed on a critical path of certain data center applications, the unavailability of the applications and services can have severe consequences, e.g., cost overruns, violation of service level agreements, etc.